Greg....I purposefully did that. I had and still do have a sour taste in my mouth about the whole arrangement that I had concerning Fiddlin Rail and other exceptional dogs that I was never able to utilize to their true potential. I am not going to air any dirty laundry here and the fact of the matter is I need to just get over it, but knowing what I had in my hands and not being able to use all that was in my reach, does not set well with me.
Bo'Darc Fiddlin Rail was originally named "Oggie" and later shortened to "Ogg". He was the a product of the first litter I raised out of my cornerstone female, Bo'Darc Dixie Fiddle. Ogg is/was a littermate sister to my Bo'Darc Mad Molly. I have no idea if Ogg is still alive and haven't known for years. Ogg was a little odd acting in the kennel, shy kinda mopey acting. Over the years I had this "trait" show up in my dogs from time to time. I had always felt it was some genetic glitch. I am 110% fully convinced now, that it was from the way I was raising my pups. I don't see this anymore in the dogs that I "hand raise". One of the biggest reasons I will never ever again mass produce puppies. Too much time and effort is required to do this task correctly on what will eventually be the "missing link" between an outstanding dog or just an OK kinda dog.
Back to Ogg. He left my hands when he was about 9 to 11 months old. At that time, I had him about 80% broke to being steady to wing and shot without any pressure. He was a very intelligent and trainable dog. His intelligence may have been his greatest inheritance and fortunately for me, he was able to pass this trait on thru his offspring. I never had the privilege to hunt wild birds behind Ogg. All I was able to see was some training sessions and I saw him run in a couple of field trials. One field trial, I was shot by the other handler competing against Ogg, while I was trying to video my dog. I still have the video and will someday put it on the website. I wasn't very happy to say the least. Having said all that, here is my take on Ogg. Like I said he was very intelligent and trainable. He was whoa broke in about 4 sessions. He had a good nose and was a natural backer and retriever. He was trained to move out or go on, to a 2 note blast of a whistle, toot-toot. One day at a training session I witnessed him being toot-tooted, to where he became a very small white speck on the horizon. The "here" command was a 3 part sustained blast on the whistle with a raise in pitch on the second or middle part. Anyway when he blew the “here” command, Ogg like I said, was a speck in this pasture and like a rocket, came flying back to the whistle and was given the command to “hunt close” in which he hunted every square inch of a fifty foot radius around where I was standing. I was impressed then and still am to this day. He was almost controllable to the point of him being on a joy stick, you could put him anywhere you wanted, or so it seemed to me. He made a 4 or 5 time Champion, I'm not sure and further more don't care. Those accolades are not important to me. What is important to me is the fact that he could produce and pass on those traits that were found within him. To me that is the mark of a true stud dog. A dog that can produce as good as he himself is or ever better than he is. I am fortunate in the fact that in both Stitch and Hoss, I have 2 males that are able to produce better than their sires. To me, this is not a knock on their sires but rather a true testament to the fact that they were true stud dogs, their offspring were more than they were.
A plan is in the works to revise my website. It will be very special in comparison to what I have now and in the new website I will have a page for Ogg. Up till now it was just from the mating of Bo'Darc Dixie Fiddle to Rail's Little Jake that I was able to hang on to Dixie's genetics. This thru Ogg and Mad Molly. Now a whole new dimension has been opened to me from Dixie's other son, Bo'Darc Dixie Delivery aka "Dave", the mating of Big Delivery to Bo'Darc Dixie Fiddle. With one Dave litter on the ground and one more due in a couple of weeks, Dave's offspring will help solidify what I already have thru Ogg and Molly Dog. Below are a few things I have on Ogg.
"Your legacy should be that you made it better than it was when you got it."
a quote from Lee Iacocca
